


Follow You Down

by idrilhadhafang



Series: Sequel Trilogy Missing Scenes [30]
Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Awesome Leia Organa, Evil Snoke (Star Wars), Forced to Watch, Forced to hurt somebody, Horror, Leia Organa Needs a Hug, M/M, Mama Bear Leia, Missing Scene, Movie: Star Wars: The Force Awakens, POV Leia Organa, POV Outsider, Space Mom Leia Organa, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-17 12:20:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29841414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/idrilhadhafang/pseuds/idrilhadhafang
Summary: Snoke forces Leia to hear Poe’s torture.
Relationships: Poe Dameron/Ben Solo, Poe Dameron/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Poe Dameron/Kylo Ren
Series: Sequel Trilogy Missing Scenes [30]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1931056
Kudos: 1
Collections: Allbingo





	Follow You Down

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Threats from Outside
> 
> Disclaimer: I own nothing.
> 
> Author’s Notes: Trigger warning for, obviously, torture, Forced to Watch. It’s honestly just a headcanon of mine; I don’t think that DLF will make it canon (maybe when they turn Hoth into a ski resort?) but it does raise the stakes a bit. Title from the Aviators song of the same name.

She heard about the deaths on Tuanul — a whole village wiped out in almost an instant, except for Poe. She’d felt it too, and it was still hard for her to wrap her head around, the whole idea that her son could have done it.  
  
It was selfish. She knew it was selfish to worry about that when innocent people had been murdered just for sheltering Poe and Tekka. But it was still her son. She could remember how he had been such a sweet boy, wild-haired and messy.  
  
It wasn’t supposed to be this way. Ben was supposed to be happy, safe. Not imitating a man who, not long ago, he’d been disgusted by.  
  
***  
  
Poe had been captured. Leia wasn’t naive; she knew what inevitably happened next. One of her boys would all but break open the skull of another one of her boys, and they’d hurt. And she would feel it, all of it, isolated by distance and all but imprisoned by it, unable to do anything about it.  
  
_You can take a shuttle,_ she told herself. _You can’t just leave them both._  
  
Could she, though? Could she just leave the Resistance to head to Jakku personally? To the Finalizer, just to save them both?  
  
_Maybe you’re not strong enough._ That was her problem. Torn between a greater galaxy and the needs of the few. She loved the galaxy, but also loved both her boys — Poe was not her son; he was her friend Shara’s son, and Shara would hate her from beyond the grave for trying to take what wasn’t hers. (Not to mention failing to protect Poe) But it didn’t make her love Poe and Kylo any less.  
  
She had known them both all too well. And in that light...would Kylo hurt Poe?  
  
He had no problem hurting others. Faces and names that Leia hadn’t even known. She had felt Kylo’s repulsion at torturing his first prisoner, how he’d vomited, how he’d cried when no one could see...and she wished that she could do more than just reaching through the Force to try and comfort him.  
  
(He ignored her. Maybe he didn’t think he was worthy of it)  
  
Kaydel spoke to her. “Do you think he’ll hurt Poe?” she said to Leia. All blonde buns, all worry for a compatriot at least.  
  
Leia tried to think of the boy that Ben had been. The boy that had played with Poe when they were younglings, when they were both mud-splattered and making up stories about Jedi Kylo. (Kylo. Who knew that an innocent fantasy could be used for evil?)  
  
“Lieutenant, I don’t know,” Leia finally said.  
  
***  
  
She hoped he wouldn’t hurt Poe. That there was at least a speck of gentleness in him. He wouldn’t hurt Poe. He wouldn’t hurt his best friend. The man he loved. He had loved and believed in Poe; he wouldn’t just hurt him like he did the others.  
  
She could catch glimpses. Glimpses of images — Poe forced to his knees — but also feelings: Kylo wondering what Poe was doing here. That he shouldn’t be there. And Tekka — the realization that he’d have to get the map out of Poe. Hoping that Poe would just tell him — but knowing he wouldn’t.  
  
It was a glimmer of kindness, of gentleness, but it was a promise.  
  
***  
  
It was after a meeting, going over Snap’s reconnaissance report on Starkiller Base, that Leia felt a jolt go through her skull. _Poe._ They were hurting one of her boys. Someone _she_ loved.  
  
“General!” Kaydel shouted even as she stumbled out of the meeting, mumbling something about not feeling well, being tired.  
  
Her head hurt. And standing at the window of the D’Qar base, in her room, she felt the pain more. Beatings. An interrogation droid, almost like the one that Vader had used but more to hurt than probe...  
  
_Hello, General,_ Snoke sneered in her mind.  
  
Him. Of course him.  
  
“You think that _mind rape_ will break me?” Leia said coolly. “Vader couldn’t probe my mind. My own father. What makes you think you’re superior to him?”  
  
Snoke chuckled wryly in her mind. _I know. You’re resistant to mind probes...I would say “mind rape” is too simplistic a word. I have something more specialized for you. Do you think you can bear the torture of those you love?_  
  
Leia’s breathing hitched in horror. She knew what Snoke spoke of. She had been all composed during her meeting with Tarkin...until he’d threatened Alderaan. Until she’d watched her friends and family die. She had born her capture by Vader at Bespin — but Han being tortured by Vader and later frozen was something that she could never bear.  
  
_So you_ can _feel,_ Snoke sneered. _And here I thought you cared nothing for your boys. For Kylo Ren and Poe Dameron. I did so much more than “just” train him._  
  
Images, flooding Leia’s mind. Ben, dangled over sharp rocks. Scenes from his “training” that to any outsider, would have been called abuse.  
  
“You’re a monster,” Leia said, lowly.  
  
_Who’s the bigger monster, General? The one who made him stronger, toughened him, or the woman who never did anything to help him?_  
  
“You’re still a monster.” And yet, Leia thought, it struck her that she hadn’t done anything to help Kylo. Her Ben, suffering under the grip of a tyrant, and she did nothing.  
  
_I can’t invade your mind — but I can make you watch._  
  
***  
  
The pain exploding through Leia’s mind was like a minefield going off. A minefield full of plasma mines. Because Ben was being tortured by Snoke. Hurt. Coerced into torturing Poe. And Kylo, resisting.  
  
_Stop. Just stop..._  
  
Her son’s pleas.  
  
It was dangerous to reach for him through the Force, but she wasn’t about to let him suffer. Not when he and Poe both would suffer.  
  
_Ben,_ she said. _I’m here._  
  
Being thrown out, like a blast door had closed in his mind. Blinking, horrified, Leia said, “What the stang did you do to him?!”  
  
_It’s easy,_ Snoke said. _He doesn’t want you._  
  
But it was more than that. Leia knew it. Knew that her son was being so invaded and punished that he was being taught more how to hate. Hating her for being unable to do anything. Hating Poe for being loved and protected where Kylo wasn’t.  
  
All over a perversion of a Force Bond that Snoke had formed with Ben. A Force Bond she had only learned about later. Ben had a gift for forming bonds with people, almost Exile-like. She hadn’t thought that it would cause him so much pain.  
  
***  
  
The pain continued, even as Poe was tortured. Even as Kylo struggled against Snoke’s invasions, the electric shock-like explosions in his mind. Leia reached out, trying to keep the pain at bay. It was, in the end, the best she could do. That was the worst part, she thought, feeling helpless even when she was being spread thin to save her two boys.  
  
It was too much. She felt so tired. So very weak. Even as she forced herself to stay awake and upright...  
  
The ground all but swam up to meet her as the darkness wrapped itself around her. The darkness, enveloping itself around her even as she fell into unconsciousness.  
  
***  
  
“You’re awake.” Kalonia greeted her later, gently stroking her face. “That was a reckless thing you did. You nearly died.”  
  
“Snoke is a monster, Harter.” Leia knew Harter would most likely be frightened by the level of hatred in her voice, the levels of rage there, but Leia knew that it wasn’t to be trifled with. “He hurt my boys.”  
  
“Poe and Kylo?”  
  
Leia nodded. "I need to go to them. When I can stand.” Then again, Leia could safely say that nothing could hold her back from strangling Snoke. From all but damning the First Order to keep her boys safe.  
  
“I know. Leia, I am so sorry.” Harter said. “Just rest. You can’t save us all if you can barely stand.”  
  
Leia settled back. In her mind, she prayed for Bail and Breha, and Shara, to watch over her boys. Keep them safe.  
  
She hated that it was the only thing she could do now.


End file.
